


Panic Is What We Do

by Kleenexwoman



Series: How many times does an angel fall? [3]
Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-07
Updated: 2019-09-07
Packaged: 2020-10-11 22:29:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20553707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kleenexwoman/pseuds/Kleenexwoman
Summary: Crowley pops into his office in Hell and runs into a few of his colleagues.





	Panic Is What We Do

Use your imagination  
Learn to keep secrets too  
You don't change the world by sitting in your office  
Sitting in your office is changing you  
\--World Inferno/Friendship Society, “Canonize Philip K. Dick, OK?” 

~*~

Crowley finally made it to Hell from California. He avoided Wisconsin for strategic reasons and Ohio on principle. 

The American headquarters was in Hell, Michigan. Crowley played minigolf while he watched a couple get married at the wedding chapel next door. He pocketed a few “Get Out of Hell Free” cards from the gift shop in case they were actually useful. 

The address he’d been given turned out to be the public library. He got into the elevator and pressed the button for the basement, and got out into the basement. It was dim and filled with more books, furniture in disrepair, and cardboard boxes. There were no demons whatsoever. Crowley got back into the elevator and went back upstairs. He leaned on the counter of the information desk and tried to figure out how to phrase the question to the bespectacled lady knitting behind it. 

“Upstairs, downstairs, or Akashic records?” she asked, never looking up from her knitting. 

“Downstairs, thanks.” 

“Hold down the flame button, it’s right next to the emergency call button. I’d wish you a nice day, but that seems unlikely.” 

“You never know.” Crowley drummed his fingers on the desk. “So...what are you? Angel, demon, psychic?” 

“PhD in Library Sciences and a member of the local Chamber of Commerce. Any other questions?” 

“Is this real marble?” 

“The elevator is over there, sir.” 

~*~

Crowley had a great home office. It housed his computer, but it also had a drafting board. The drafting board was primarily a home for rulers and compasses and other things that could be used to poke or slap someone’s sensitive bits, as well as a nice surface to dramatically sweep paper off so you could throw someone across. Sometimes he actually used it to draw. He had an Italian leather sofa that had been used in a number of casting couch-themed movies that were released direct to home video. He had a giant swoopy desk that housed every desk toy he’d ever seen on the Home Shopping Network, and an ergonomic chair he’d plucked from one of J.G. Ballard’s wet dreams. He’d made sure the room was a corner office with a big skylight so God and the angels could spy on his evil plans if they deigned to look close enough (and so the succulents in geometric pots who put up with witnessing his shit got plenty of light). 

Unfortunately, he was at work. His desk housed a dead African violet, a moldy mouse-and-jam sandwich, and a small stack of notes. He chewed on the sandwich and flipped through the papers. Commendation for Altamont, complaint about trespassing from the Nain Rouge (petty little bastard), memo about throwing trash into the hallways instead of into trash cans (the memo was encouraging about it). 

“Hey, Crowley’s back in the house! Get over here, buddy.” Cthulhu raised a claw and beckoned Crowley over to his desk, where he was slitting open the top of a shipping box with his claw. “I think you’ll appreciate this.” 

Crowley waved and headed over. Cthulhu had always been a decent bloke, for an eldritch being who spread chaos and terror. Baphomet and Yaldabaoth stood by, peering over Cthulhu’s leathery wings. They’d both been architects before the fall; Crowley had been a few rungs under them, working in construction. Down here, their desks were all crammed together in one haphazard jumble. 

“So I spent a couple of decades tormenting this one guy. Terrified of absolutely everything, but also crazy racist. I thought it would be easy to get him to spark some violence, right? Nah. Guy stays in his house all day, but the people he writes letters to are mostly just on board with his depictions of Yours Truly and colleagues and like, not the rest of it at all. He died broke and I figured, eh, take a nap for a few decades, right?” Cthulhu flipped the box lids open. 

“Naps are the best,” Crowley agreed. 

“This guy gets it. Anyway, I sense some attention, I wake back up. Turns out…” Cthulhu held a soft green thing up to his face. “I got so popular, they made me into a plushie!” 

“Damn, that’s how you know you’re good,” Baphomet remarked. S/he stroked one of the soft toys sitting in the box. “You think they’ll ever make me into something that cute?” 

“No harm in trying. C’mon, take one.” Cthulhu passed the plush toys around. “So, Crowley. Heard about your big summoning. You got the Bowie contract?” 

“I couldn’t get him to sign anything. Hung out in his pool for a week before he tried to get some hippie lady to exorcise me. Nice trip though.” Crowley wiggled his new toy’s tentacles. “Yal, I ran into your ex in California.” 

Yaldabaoth grimaced. “Sophia? I haven’t seen her since before the Fall.” He hugged his plushie with his scaly tail and rested his leonine chin on its soft little head. “How did she look? Not that I care.” 

“She got a tan. And she’s either dating some writer chap or sending him visions, I’m not sure.” 

Yaldabaoth sank his fangs into the toy and growled. “She’s dating a mortal? Who?” 

“Get this, his name literally means ‘Fat Horsefucker’.” Crowley grinned. “Bit of a step down, right?” 

“A writer? Are you kidding? You could not have given me worse news.” Yaldabaoth picked a bit of fluff from his teeth. “Not after Cthulhu’s toy thing.” 

“Hey, don’t drag me into this.” Cthulhu hefted the box and walked away. “C’mon, Crowley, you know how he gets about his breakup. I’m going to spread plushie terror somewhere else.” 

“I just mean...argh, you know how it is. Chicks talk, and I know she’s been talking shit about me, and he’s a writer. My presence in history is going to be a footnote in a shitty novella.” 

Baphomet rolled hir eyes at Crowley and patted Yaldabaoth on what passed for his back. “Let’s get you some nightshade tea, sweetie. Crowley, nice to see you.” 

Crowley sighed and finished his sandwich. He would have felt sorry for Yaldabaoth if he hadn’t been kind of a pompous prick about his designs even before the Fall. Sophia had been polite enough to make small talk with him over tacos in a gas station parking lot for about five minutes before warning him away from the City of Angels. “That concrete jungle is full of archons, smog, and humans hawking their souls for a gold record. Keep serving the Light, Serpiel. It’s the only thing that’s real.” 

He’d mumbled “Changed it to Crowley, actually,” with his mouth slightly full of chorizo. 

She’d eyed him over her cigarette. “You weren’t involved with those Babalon* idiots, were you?” 

*Another, more mortal Crowley had actually dissuaded Jack Parsons and his con artist buddy Ron from their ill-conceived (ha!) working to bring about the New Aeon. His “third cousin” Antonia had convinced the unwitting subject of the whole project to leave the gaggle of sex-starved nerds and get herself checked out at the Planned Parenthood in San Francisco. Heaven was on a pro-life kick at the time according to his intelligence, so submitting that particular Deed under “facilitated an abortion” just looked better than “got rid of an unplanned Antichrist.” 

“Honestly,” Crowley had said, “I just got into town.”


End file.
